Stars $200 tourney

Saturday night, I played a $3 rebuy to qualify for today's $200+$15 $500,000 guaranteed tourney.

I managed to qualify ... caught some good hands, hit a nice draw or two, and then coasted into qualifying, although it got a little hairy at the end when the blinds got to be monstrous.

By the time the tourney started, there were over 3500 entrants (which means almost $50,000 in fees for PokerStars) so the odds were pretty long, but 378 places paid. Top prize $140K ... as I type this, it's down to the final table.

I played pretty tight, didn't catch much early. Had QQ raised 5x ... called, by an early position limper, flop 789 ... I bet the pot, called ... turn K ... limper bets out, enough to put me all in ... and I have to fold.

Managed to double up a bit later to get back above water. Caught trips, up to 4500 chips. Then I went dead ... no cards, nothing hardly to even semibluff with. I caught AK and called a very short stack all in to give me a few more chips.

Finally, get 77 under the gun, the blinds are pretty big now and my stack is not that big. My raise pretty much commits me to the pot. Big stack comes over the top of me and he has TT. I busted out 1051st and never really a factor in the tournament.

The highlight for me was snatching the last few chips from Noah Boeken ... who my buddy Hank advises is a poker whiz kid ("EXCLUSIVE" at PokerStars). He was basically down to nothing when I eliminated him though.

Anyway, hopefully, this is the first of many of these tournaments for me. It was quite the adrenal rush. Watching the final table is crazy, AA v QQ for huge stakes, and QQ catches a Q on the flop. Looks like it's gonna end in a deal ... chip count chop at the final 3, 92K, 87K and 87K, leaving 10K on the table for the winner.